The Flower That Shattered the Stone
by Coneflower Adams
Summary: Alone with his taunting memories and no spinning wheel to help him forget, Rumpelstiltskin began to think he was finally going mad.


_Writer's note: I'd posted a part of this fic several months ago, but never finished it. I finally got around to finishing it, but also did a little editing on the first part, so I'm just posting it as a whole fic now._

* * *

He knew he wasn't crazy, at least that was before he allowed the power of the Dark One ensnare him.

After days in the magical cell, alone with his taunting memories and no spinning wheel to help him forget, Rumpelstiltskin began to think he was finally going mad.

Belle was dead. He investigated her death, finding the grave on the outskirts of her village where paupers were buried. It took every bit of willpower to not claw the ground open and see the body for himself. He could not bring back the dead. He'd made that clear to everyone who desired his help to do so, but he could barely convince himself of his own words. _Dead is dead_.

He left his True Love to rest there, the cold ground undeserving of her warm soul. The grave was proof enough.

Now, imprisoned in the magical cell made just to keep him, Rumpelstiltskin regretted not digging up Belle's grave. Doubt plagued him as he paced from one side to the other, or climbed the bars of the cell day and night. He never rested; his mind forever pondering on past mistakes, presents plans, and things to come.

It was a week after the start of his captivity that the hallucinations began. He heard his name being called, and it was by no guard and who would visit him?

"Rumpelstiltskin" her soft lilt called, echoing in his ear. Rumpelstiltskin snapped up his head to find Belle across the cell from him. He shrank back against the craggy wall of rocks, assuming it was her ghost. But, no, he realized as he blinked wide-eyed at her. It was not his cell she indwelled. The image was as if projected on the other side of the prison wall.

He couldn't breathe, couldn't move a muscle as he watched Belle's slim figure stand from the bed she was seated upon. A long, royal blue dress clung to her, a slit up the side revealing a bountiful view of her creamy right upper thigh.

"Please, Rumpelstiltskin," Belle pleaded to the air. "If you can hear me, I need you. Please, I need you." Her cheeks were flushed and stained with tears as she peered around, seeming to wait for him to materialize and answer her plea. When no answer came, Belle bent to sit again, defeat weighting on her shoulders. Her hands rested in her lap and it was then that Rumpelstiltskin spied the manacles around her wrists.

A tear dropped onto Belle's hand as she whispered, "I love you," and the vision vanished as quickly as it appeared.

He stared at the blank stone wall, heart threatening to pound out his chest. It was just a hallucination. That's it.

Rumpelstiltskin swallowed hard, his nerves on edge. Belle was dead. She was not chained to a wall in a prison calling for him to help her. _Dead is dead._ He giggled madly at the concept. Everyone assumed he was crazy. Now it was truly coming to be.

Stealthy, he scaled up the bars to the ceiling, needing to detach from whatever madness that was consuming him. He had to focus on what was to come. Soon, he'd be visited by two women asking for his help, but truly the only woman he wished to help was dead.

* * *

If she appeared again, he would ignore it. It did no good to torture himself any further. He could do that well enough on his own without hallucinations adding to the fire.

Hours passed or maybe days, he did not know anymore. The whole outside world was cut off to him, even the awareness of day and night. It was all one long, eternal night in his cave prison. The only way to mark the time was by the single meal the guards provided. Tormenting the guards was entertaining, no matter how fleeting the exchange was. He had no use for food, but the meager helping of stale bread and porridge was a brief distraction to the droning of the day.

Rumpelstiltskin maneuvered the tray through the bars, thrilling sharply as he slid it away from the cell, disappearing into the darkness of the cave. A guard was sure to trip over it. It was the least he could do to amuse himself.

A flicker of light caught the corner of his eye, and he spun around, grunting at the sight that greeted him. The image projected on the wall was back to torment him; digging the knife further into his chest. Belle was asleep on the same bed as before. Her chestnut locks splayed across the pillow her head lay upon. Her chest rose and fell, breathing life into the image. He needed to turn away, ignore it as he told himself to, but how could he tear his eyes from the beauty that was his long lost Belle.

Rumpelstiltskin stepped closer reaching a trembling hand out to the projection. Closer and closer, he inched, not breathing nor taking his eyes from Belle. If he touched the projection, to know for sure that's all it was, maybe he'd have a fraction of peace.

Deep blue eyes suddenly gazed upon him. Rumpelstiltskin froze as if turned to stone, Belle's sad eyes staring into his wide, reptilian ones. Maybe he imagined it, the recognition on her face, the way she gazed at him and not through him. Maybe this wasn't a hallucination.

Mesmerized, he stood stock still, never breaking eye contact. The sadness on her face dug a deeper hole into his heart. He was the cause of her sorrow. She loved him and yet, he sent her away like she was a leper.

"Belle" he murmured, barely able to find his voice. "Can you hear me?"

"Rumpelstiltskin?"

Her response nearly brought his heart to explode. She could hear him! The projection was not another torment his imagination had cooked up. Belle was real and she was alive!

"Belle, where are you?" he asked urgently, though it was too late to rescue her now. He was trapped until the curse began. He wouldn't even remember her on the other side of the curse, but he had to know where she was being held. Somehow he'd rescue her. He'd find a way.

"The qu-" The projection suddenly vanished in a whisk of white light.

Rumpelstiltskin stood, slack-jawed, staring at the stony wall. He swallowed noisy before his muscle learned to move again. "Belle? Belle!" He felt the wall, finding only the jaggedness of the stones.

Belle was gone again.

* * *

He waited for her. The hope to be able to talk to Belle, to know how she fared and to tell her how agonizingly sorry he was, consumed him. He knew not who held her captive, but had suspicions of who did, boiling the anger inside him. He needed the witch with the smirking blood red lips, but oh, how he dreamed of ripping those lips off her elegant face! Regina was the key to his prolonged plans. Revenge would have to wait just as rescuing Belle and finding his son.

All he could do was stare at the wall – and wait for Belle. The guard came with his daily tray of food, but he paid it no mind. If he averted his eyes from the wall, he'd miss her. The appearances were so brief, making them more precious than any gold he could ever spin.

She did not appear the next day. His fingers twitched nervously, fiddling with a small stone from the floor until it lost its usefulness and he flung the stone against the wall with a snarling. He needed her. Even if he couldn't touch her, couldn't save her from the prison holding her, at least he could see her beautiful face and hear her sweet voice.

Another day began, and his unyielding eyes never left the wall. The guard came and went, but Rumpelstiltskin took no notice of him. Even the guard's lashing comment could not break him of his vigil. But Belle did not appear that day, or the next, nor the next.

Rumpelstiltskin felt the pit of his stomach sinking lower until it nearly reached the depths of his own personal hell. The doubt of the projections being real started to creep into his mind again, but he stayed, squatted on the hard ground, eyes never wavering.

He'd lost count of the days as he watched and waited. Not long after the guard came with a useless tray of food, a shimmering light manifested on the wall and there she was. Rumpelstiltskin gasped, the sound a mixture of relief and agony, as he leap to his feet. He rushed closer to the image, but stopped short when he saw that Belle was speaking to someone.

"Rumpelstiltskin?" Belle questioned as if in doubt.

"The Dark One," a male voice replied faintly. "He must be stopped." He could not see the person, but the voice struck a chord.

"I don't know what you're talking about. And I have no idea how to kill Rumpelstiltskin." Belle's blue eyes held a defiance that overwhelmed every sense of his being.

"You don't?" the voice gnawed at his brain, and he held his head as if a horrible headache was about to strike.

"No!" Belle's yell snapped him out of his sudden frenzy. "Nor would I!"

A proud smile twisted his lips. That was his little Belle, so brave and beautiful.

"Well then I'm afraid I'm not here to rescue you." It finally hit him like a boulder falling from a cliff, smashing him into a million pieces. The voice belonged to Killian Jones. And in that instant of reckoning, Rumpelstiltskin watched as Belle collapsed to the bed unconscious and the gleam of a hook flashed in sight for a split moment.

He couldn't move, couldn't breathe, as he stared helplessly at Belle's still figure.

"So pretty," Jones' voice commented casually, "And yet so useless." The flash of the hook flew up and slammed down…before Rumpelstiltskin could see what happened, the projection vanished without a trace.

Rage flared inside his chest, exploding into his limbs and lungs. With a guttural yell, he lunged at the stone wall, clawing and banging until his fingers bled. He screamed her name over and over, agony flooding every letter, spilling out his despair.

He couldn't rescue her. Belle was helpless and in need of a hero and he couldn't rescue her.

Rumpelstiltskin stared blankly at the stone wall, Belle's lifeless body on that bed the only image he could truly see. He pushed away, stumbling to the other side of the cell and crumpling into a heap on the damp floor.

For the first time since he was told that Belle was dead, Rumpelstiltskin wept.


End file.
